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- Title
The benefit of a contralateral hearing aid for speech understanding in noise.
- Authors
Stronks, H. C.; Schrijver, A. J.; Briaire, J. J.; Frijns, J. H. M.
- Abstract
Objectives: The recently launched NaídaTM Link hearing aid (HA) can be wirelessly coupled to a Naída cochlear implant (CI). In this study, we tested the bimodal benefit of this system on speech understanding scores in noise. We applied three different noise reduction algorithms in both the CI and HA to optimize speech understanding. These algorithms included a monaural beamformer (Ultra- Zoom), a binaural beamformer (StereoZoom), and a single- channel noise reduction algorithm algorithm (Clear- VoiceTM) that reduced static noise in the speech signal. Material and methods: Fifteen unilaterally implanted CI users were contralaterally fitted with a Naída Link. Study inclusion criteria included a hearing threshold of ≤80 dB at 125 -- 500 Hz, and a CVC phoneme score of ≥80% with their CI in quiet. The Dutch Matrix test was used to determine speech reception thresholds (SRTs). A homogeneous, diffuse noise field was used. We tested SRTs in static noise as well as in a multitalker babble noise (ICRA). Beamforming and single-channel noise-reduction strategies were tested for their effectiveness in improving the SRT. Results and Conclusions: Adding a contralateral HA improved the SRT significantly by an average of 0.9 dB in static noise, and 1.7 dB in babble using omnidirectional microphone settings. Beamforming improved the average SRT in bimodal listeners by approximately 3.5 dB in static noise and by approximately 4.5 dB in multitalker babble noise, compared to the CI-alone condition. The monaural and binaural beamformers were equally effective. The addition of single-channel noise-reduction had no added benefit, either alone, or in combination with the beamforming strategies. We conclude that bimodal listening increases speech perception in both static and multitalker babble noise. We have shown that beamformers are an effective means to further improve speech understanding with the Naída Link system.
- Subjects
BELGIUM; CONFERENCES &; conventions; COCHLEAR implants; HEARING aids; NOISE; SPEECH perception
- Publication
Journal of Hearing Science, 2018, Vol 8, Issue 2, p207
- ISSN
2083-389X
- Publication type
Article